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BREWSTER COUNTY – The Brewster County Groundwater Conservation District is considering a permit request that could set a precedent for commercial water exportation by county landowners.

Buddy and Kristin Cavness, owners of Mustang Propane in Marathon, hope to use a well they recently drilled to sell water to an oil exploration company in Brewster County. The Cavnesses are seeking an operating permit and possibly a transport permit that would allow them to pump about 42,000 gallons of water a day, mix it as a drilling lubricant, and truck it to the oil field. It’s a situation the groundwater district board faced for the first time during their meeting on Tuesday morning at the Brewster County Courthouse. Chairman Tom Beard told the roomful of concerned Marathon residents that the board would not take any action this week and planned to proceed carefully.

“We are at the very first step on this,” said Beard, who as Kristin’s relative added that he would not vote on anything to do with her. “Our intent is to go very slow.”

The board had two immediate reasons for not taking any action this week, he explained. Since the district was created in 2002, the board has been gathering information on wells and area aquifers and developing a groundwater management plan. They’ve never gotten around to creating an application for a transport or export permit. With no permit application, the agenda item to discuss and consider a possible transport permit was void. Also, the operating permit application, which the Cavnesses have submitted, needs to be revised.

“Even though they have filed their application for an operating permit, there’s a lot of information we need that’s not on there,” Beard said, such as how much water they expect to produce and who will be buying it.

The district board will work on drafting a transport/export permit application and revising the operating permit application at a public workshop at 8:30 a.m. on April 7 at the commissioners courtroom in Alpine.

Until the board makes a decision, the Cavnesses will only be able to operate their well as an exempt well, meaning they can’t produce more than about 17 gallons per minute or 25,000 per day, Beard said. They already have a drilling permit, but it was granted retroactively after a misunderstanding, he said.

In response to an audience member’s question, board members denied any involvement of County Commissioner Ruben Ortega in their decision-making, and Buddy Cavness said that Ortega, while his employee, has no control over his business.

The Cavnesses’ permit request this week raised the specter of water exportation. Beard said he had hoped the issue would no longer be germane after Rio Nuevo’s thwarted proposal to sell water from regional state lands in 2002. But permit requests like the Cavnesses’ could become more common as rising oil and gas prices drive other exploration companies to the Big Bend.

“The oil field is coming this way,” Cavness told the district board Tuesday. “Just because I’m the first doesn’t mean I’m going to be the last.”

Calling himself a guinea pig, he added that as a Marathon resident, he’s personally concerned about conserving the area’s water supply, but future export permit applicants might not be.

Beard agreed he probably wouldn’t be the last export permit request. “We want to get the first one right,” he said.

Whether the Cavnesses even need an export permit also must be decided by the district board. Cavness said water from his production well would be kept within Brewster County, and the current assumption is that in-district transport doesn’t require an export permit.

But Beard thinks in-district export should be treated differently if the water is being transported off a landowner’s property for commercial use. When it comes to groundwater, he said, whose land it’s coming from and whose land it’s being transported to is more important than whether it’s crossing county lines.

“Throughout the state most districts and most people think that when somebody produces water from a well on their land, it’s usually for use on their land,” Beard said after the meeting. “If it’s not, it ought to be subject to different rules, in my view.”

Another problem was brought up at Tuesday’s meeting that could cloud the water exportation issue and the Cavnesses’ permit request.

The Marathon Aquifer, which the Cavnesses would be pumping, is the least studied underground water source in the area. How large it is, how much water it contains, and how much pumping it can support is all unknown.

Beard said the Texas Water Development Board is now gathering data to create a model of the aquifer, and Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst has charged the state senate Natural Resources Committee with evaluating the impact of oil and gas exploration on groundwater. But until those efforts are further along, the district will have very little information to work with in evaluating permit requests.

To complicate matters, there is also little data on existing wells currently tapping the Marathon Aquifer. Only landowners pumping about 17 gallons per minute are required to register their well with the district, but all well owners are encouraged to register. Besides drillers’ logs, that’s the only way the district can determine how much groundwater is being pumped from area aquifers, and unfortunately, relatively few wells are registered, including wells belonging to the city of Alpine and the Marathon and Study Butte water supply companies.

“Without the knowledge of existing wells, we can’t do our job,” Beard said.

Because of that, some audience members said the district shouldn’t allow any commercial pumping of water from the aquifer.

Rawles Williams, who owns property less than half a mile from the Cavnesses proposed production well, said until the capacity of the aquifer is known, it shouldn’t be tapped for commercial exportation.

Board vice president Mike Davidson said personally he agrees that until more is known about the impact of large production wells, the district shouldn’t move forward. But, he said, the board also couldn’t deny a permit request that fulfilled district requirements. He added that, in the Cavnesses’ case, pumping 42,000 gallons per day isn’t actually much water.

Beard responded he wasn’t sure that the district would grant a permit if there’s inadequate data.

“I think that’s what we would have to debate,” he said.

After the meeting Beard said the board would have to make a decision in a reasonable amount of time, but could put tight restrictions on a permit, such as making it short-term or requiring weekly monitoring.

Also questioned was why there is so little well data, and the board responded that they have put public notices in newspapers and sent letters with tax bills encouraging landowners to register their wells.

Some audience members pushed the board to be more aggressive.

“At some point you’re going to have to go door to door,” Marathon resident Mike Mountz said. “How else will you have any data to get accurate numbers.”

Board members Leo Dominguez, Rob Dean and Billito Donnel explained that they have tried not to be heavy-handed and want to work with landowners as partners.

“It’s time to get heavy-handed,” said Marathon resident James Evans.

“We’re not going to get heavy-handed,” Beard responded. “I’m not going to be a part of that.”

Williams, a researcher for Sul Ross State University’s Rio Grande Research Center, said there are grants available for groundwater studies and his organization would be willing to help the district get that funding. An education and outreach program encouraging landowners to register their wells could be part of a study.

“You get more flies with honey,” Williams said.

Board and audience members agreed that the Cavnesses’ permit request would hopefully renew interest in well-registration and controlling groundwater exportation.

“We need to start on the road to responsible regulation of our limited water resources,” Beard said after the meeting. “We’d prefer to go about it slowly, but it appears because of the applications presently before us and the challenge presently before us, we’re going to need to proceed a little faster. It’s just the next step in trying to help landowners manage their water in a responsible manner.”

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